Day 187, Quote 18: “Reach Out Eagerly”

The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience. -Eleanor Roosevelt

I’ve rewritten this three times. I don’t typically go through and edit heavily. I’ll look for spelling or grammar. Maybe clarify, but I don’t typically reread to rewrite. But I just wasn’t saying what I wanted to in the way I wanted to. My headspace was weird this morning and I think that’s why I’ve been rewriting.

There’s a lot in my head that I want to get out, but even to me I don’t know how to formulate the words.

I guess I’ll start with the obvious. I finished the second week of work and I’m about to start week three. This is still a brand new adventure and I’m curious to know when the newness will fade, but I’m hopeful that it won’t fade greatly. I’ll get into a groove and the anxiety and fear of screwing up will disappear, but the excitement of new project aspects will keep it fresh.

I always say that I’m “bright-eyed and bushy tailed” and I’m eager. I’m eager to learn and to get involved. I’ve been told that’s not always a good thing.

Well, for me, it’s more than just having money to live or in some cases survive.

I want to be passionate. I want to light the world up.

I want to be fired up about what I’m doing. It’s not that I get sad when it’s not a fantastic day – trust me I know that’s not possible every day. However, every day has the possibility of being good.

If the flame is dying or the attitude towards the position and work is or has faded and it feels like you’re dragging ass to your “job” then I do think you need to make a change. A change won’t happen in a few days, but if you figure out a plan and create a realistic timeline, you can work towards change. I digress.

This job isn’t just a job. It’s an opportunity to make the world brighter, to fill the gap and create possibility. It’s the same way I view coaching. I never thought I would want to be a coach, but with every person and every check in, I find myself full as they realize their own greatness.

People need to be given opportunity and choices to take them.

At work there was less anxiety, more reading, more writing and more understanding about how I fit into the puzzle. And I know that as I make connections and take the lead in meetings I will be more active and feel more engaged. I will feel capable of hitting the ground running every Monday.

There are aspects I’m comfortable with already and others I’m getting used to.

I haven’t had to lead meetings or monitor task delegation in a while, but I’m excited to get back to it. It’s slightly comparative to coaching because I do check in with clients in between calls about how their weeks are going and how they are feeling about progress. While I may not necessarily delegate all the tasks they are working on throughout the week, my clients and I come up with their to-do lists to work towards whatever their goals are – this is similar.

I love seeing tasks be accomplished and the puzzle come together. We can see the potential as it comes together.

I love reading research articles and digging, I’m currently researching medical drones – that’s something I never thought I would be reading about. Another part of my role will be assisting in editing abstracts this month that are being submitted for the international conference hosted this winter.

This really is a good balance of dancing on the comfort zone line.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous about having a new schedule, but I’ve been able to adapt to it.

I welcome change, but I also know that there’s an adjustment period. I tell my clients this and this is something that I have to remind myself sometimes – we aren’t super human even if we do extraordinary things sometimes.

So, sometimes it’s easy and sometimes it’s like a slap in the face.

This was somewhere in between.

~~~

This is the part of the post where I’ve written and deleted and rewritten a few sentences over and over again.

I’ve been to the gym and kept up with my workout schedule and I’m glad that I’ve pushed myself to focus on it because it’s helped me get through other things this week.

I’ve been dealing with anxiety stemming from interpersonal relationship dynamics with friends. It’s been causing flashbacks, which have been just as vivid as ever.

In some cases, I’m going through the motions in the memory and in others I’m watching the scene. There’s no obvious rhyme or reason to the memories I’m seeing.

It’s recess. It’s gym class. It’s the grocery store. It’s holding a roll of film and then holding the photos.

It’s clips. It’s full color. It’s slow motion, it’s hyper speed.

But I can taste them. I can smell them. I can feel them.

I never used to get flashbacks like this when I was stressed. Only the past few years. I think we all go through periods where we think back on memories, but it’s literally as though a little person is digging into a filing cabinet and exclaiming “aha! this one.”

I’m planning on journaling this weekend and seeing if I can make any connections of the memories to the relationship dynamics. After breakfast this morning when JP and I were talking about our plans for the day and I told him I wanted to get some writing done and about the flashbacks this week, I started crying hysterically. Physically, it came out of no where. Mentally, I knew it was bound to happen some time.

It’s weird because my headspace overall this week has been pretty damn good. I never second guessing the typical things that take a hit – eating, working out and sleep. I felt capable of getting everything I had to do done, and getting things I wanted to do done as well. It’s also possible that I’ve finally had time to settle down from running around this week and it just caught up to me. It’s possible that just “brain dumping” here and into my journal will give me the clarity that I need to lessen the flashbacks and regulate my anxiety. If I feel I need more, then I’ll do more.

For today, I planned some writing and a possible nap before going out with a former client for dinner. Since nothing NEEDS to be done today, I’m giving myself the chance to go through motions as they feel good.